Editorial: Budgeting priorities

District service funds sacrifice long-term gains for short-term bragging rights.

Copyright 2015: Houston Chronicle

Updated 9:44 am, Friday, September 18, 2015

Photo: Gary Coronado, Staff

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Mayor Annise Parker shown with a 1915 prototype for the City of Houston flag at a press conference in the City Council Chambers of Houston City Hall Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2015, in Houston, Texas. The City of Houston, Preservation Houston and the North American Vexillogical Association (NAVA) announced the restoration of the flag. The prototype was made by the seamstresses at Levy Bros. department store and then sent to New York where it served as the model for the official silk flag. ( Gary Coronado / Houston Chronicle ) less

Mayor Annise Parker shown with a 1915 prototype for the City of Houston flag at a press conference in the City Council Chambers of Houston City Hall Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2015, in Houston, Texas. The City of ... more

Photo: Gary Coronado, Staff

Editorial: Budgeting priorities

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In Houston's strong-mayor form of government, it can be hard for district council members to tout their accomplishments during election season. The mayor controls the budget, the city agenda and nearly every facet of City Hall. What else is left? But thanks to the recent creation of district service funds, council members now have something to brag about.

When these district budgets were first created in 2014, council members said they planned to use the $1 million they annually received for small, but important, neighborhood issues that they felt the mayor wasn't addressing quickly enough. After looking at the list of how council members spent their dough, it isn't clear whether their priorities are always brag-worthy.

Councilman Larry Green, in District K, spent $18,000 on catering for a small business economic development summit. Councilman Dwight Boykins, in District D, spent $1,850 on yard signs for a lot weeding program. And Councilman Oliver Pennington, in District G, spent $9,622 on mulch for parks.

There's little wrong with these projects on their own. What park couldn't use more mulch? But at a time when potholes, pensions and public safety remain Houston's top problems, voters should wonder why we're spending limited taxpayer dollars on secondary priorities. In fact, much of the money used to fund these district budgets was redirected through the city's capital improvements program from ReBuild Houston, the worst-first program that is supposed to address Houston's long-term infrastructure needs. Spending money on catering is hardly putting our worst needs first.

Council members didn't only use their $1 million budgets on these one-time projects. They also routinely spent on overtime payments for the Houston Police Department, Houston Fire Department and other city employees. City Council is trying to have it both ways, refusing to address the big-picture problems with budgets while creating loopholes to fund HPD and HFD.

HFD went over budget last year specifically because it was unable to get its overtime under control. HPD has seen its own budget skyrocket over the past decade while the number of officers has declined. Diverting dollars to these public safety departments without addressing the core of our budgetary headache merely perpetuates the underlying causes of Houston's fiscal crisis. Even worse, these overtime payments can cause unexpected cost spikes when the city calculates what it owes for pension obligations, creating additional burdens for Houstonians decades down the line.

Individual district service funds may have made it easier for council members to brag about their accomplishments over the past two years, but they've certainly made it harder to claim that they're working for our city's long-term success.